[New-Poetry] Re:An Era of Détente for Creative-Wri ting Programs

[David Graham]

Mark, I'm not saying what you apparently think I'm saying below.  I  
was complaining about what a hypocritical blowhard a poet like August  
Kleinzahler is, who happily accepts cushy teaching gigs and reading  
invitations from the very institutions he then sneers at so self- 
righteously. Mostly, it seems, without much familiarity with the life  
of a regular faculty member in such a program.

Apart from that, concerning the value of MFA programs and the much- 
proclaimed but little-illustrated "bureaucratization of poetry" you  
keep mentioning, we should probably just agree to disagree at this  
point.


========================================
David Graham
grahamd at ripon.edu

Home Page:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz

Poetry Library:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/DGPoLibrary.html
==========================================




On Jul 2, 2009, at 5:03 PM, Mark Weiss wrote:

> Are you saying all these things would make him a better poet?
>
> A lot of people seem to enjoy their MFA experience, and a lot of  
> people fatten at the trough. Neither is particularly problematic.  
> It's the bureaucratization of poetry that's the problem, and it's  
> an ongoing disaster. Somewbody quoted Richard Hugo. Not to speak  
> ill of the dead, but where did he come off teaching people how not  
> to write?
>
> Mark
>
> At 12:09 PM 7/2/2009, you wrote:
>> Yes.  While I don't teach in an MFA program, I imagine it's  
>> irksome to be lectured on how cushy and safe one's life is by  
>> someone who skims off the cream of the university creative writing  
>> system while shouldering no institutional commitments or  
>> responsibilities--never teaching big sophomore lit classes or  
>> freshman comp; never chairing a department or faculty committee;  
>> never advising or counseling students; never writing letters of  
>> recommendation; never serving on institutional task forces or  
>> search committees; and, of course, never organizing the visiting  
>> writers' series which provides the blowhard in question the  
>> platform for such lofty dismissals.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Jul 2, 2009, at 10:51 AM,  
>> <mailto:AlMaginnes at aol.com>AlMaginnes at aol.com wrote:
>>
>>> True. August Kleinzhaler might find "real life" a lot more real  
>>> if he practiced what he preached and didn't take any university  
>>> or grant money.
>>>

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